Wagner is a rare bird in Perth; the second *Tristan und Isolde* in 12 years worth the wait, no less for being a concert performance, and for bringing Skelton's masterful interpretation to an Australian audience

This performance marked Sir Mark Elder’s debut with the company and, beginning with the overture, he offered his individual interpretation of the score. He had an enormous range of dynamics and his tempi varied widely with the emotional values of each scene.

A strong cast headed by Peter Seiffert perform in this visually appealing Tannhäuser at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin, where Markus Brück excels as Wolfram and Petra Maria Schnitzer takes on the role of the temptress Venus and the saintly Elisabeth.

Sometimes catching a performance with its second cast can be as revealing as attending a first night, and that was the case with this production of Rigoletto by the Canadian director Robert Carsen at La Monnaie in Brussels.

Mussorgsky’s rich, complex music and Boris Godunov’s tragic story is told with very original vision in Tugan Sokhiev’s concert version. The Salle Pleyel made no mistake about it: this Boris will stay in our memories for a while.

In Act II of Tannhäuser, Hermann, Landgrave of Thuringia, sets the theme of the singing contest that is about to take place in his hall by asking: “Can you describe love’s nature to me?” To some extent, the entire opera is an examination of two very different answers to that question.